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Recently, a group of high school educators in Southern California were placed on administrative leave for their response, via social media, to their students participating in a ‘Day Without Immigrants’ on February 16, 2017. Their school’s students were just part of thousands of students - across the state and nation - that stayed home that day in order to demonstrate solidarity with adults in their communities who stayed home from work to demonstrate the fiscal impact immigrants and immigrant families have on our local, regional and national economies. Although since deleted, at least five high school teachers and one counselor, posted messages on Facebook celebrating that so many Latino students missed classes that day. These posts included comments about the students being ‘lazy’ and ‘drunk’, or that the cafeteria ‘was cleaner without them.’ (see entire story here: Teachers put on leave for 'Day Without Immigrants' social media postsand sample of posts below)

At the end of 2016, we were presented with a different type of story about the end of a semester. Instead of stories about finals, celebrations, grades or even holiday events, we heard a story about “quitting.” That’s right - QUITTING. It wasn’t about an educator quitting either. It was about a student quitting. Kansas State University Freshman Billy Willson finished his first, and his last, semester right before the end of 2016. In a Facebook post, he announced that he was dropping out, despite having earned a 4.0 grade point average. According to Willson, he was going to start his own business and learn more from that experience than anything he could hope to do at Kansas State, or any other higher institution for that matter. He simultaneously set off a couple of controversies. One, he ran a photo of himself giving the finger to Kansas State which angered many in the education community who labeled him a spoiled and profane millennial. But more importantly, he also set off an even l…